


have mercy on my mind

by franknstar



Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Character Death, Coping, M/M, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-01
Updated: 2019-01-01
Packaged: 2019-10-01 21:36:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,646
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17251814
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/franknstar/pseuds/franknstar
Summary: Caleb still thinks about him.(Modern AU, New Year's fic. Contains Spoilers)





	have mercy on my mind

The breath from Caleb’s lips comes out like white fog. The sky is clear, the moon is bright, and the stars are making him feel even smaller and insignificant than he already is. His hands are shoved into his pockets, fingers numb from the cold. He hates the sharp wind hitting his cheeks, he hates how his dry and chapped lips crack and bleed, and he hates the hollow hole in his heart. Caleb hates many things, and loves very few. Most of the things he loves have damned him to live in hellacious ways and do horrifying things. Caleb hates to love. 

There’s a tugging on his pant leg. He looks down to see Nott. She’s meek and has a stare that begs of something. He pulls a hand from his pocket and lowers it to Nott. She takes hold of it with both hands and clings to it tight. There’s some type of damning silence the top of the hill they’ve climbed offers them. The last time he heard silence like this was when he watched the life drain from Molly’s eyes. Caleb has loved. Caleb has lost. Caleb has existed. Yet Caleb has also lost track of so much time that it seems like he’s only been lucid for just a few moments. Caleb feels as if he’s a monster inside his own skin, but according to Nott, he’s the most sensible and reasonable of all of them. 

“Come in,” she begs. “They’re worried.”

“Aren’t they always?” he asks under his voice, then directs his attention back up to the sky. “Can’t I just be alone for once?”

Nott’s grip loosens on his hands. “I’m sorry that I bothered you. Just… don’t get too cold, okay? And be sure to come in before it starts to snow.” She lets go and lingers by his side for several seconds before she walks away. 

Caleb didn’t mean to be short with her. He just wishes to be alone with his thoughts right now. He wants to be alone and have the ability to feel nothing. The sky’s too clear for snow right now. By tomorrow morning, though, the ground is supposed to be covered and there’s a chance that they won’t be able to leave where they’re currently staying. Being stuck in a small cabin they rented to celebrate New Year’s doesn’t sound like the best right now. Caleb feels smothered in an empty room. 

Instead of putting his hand back in his pocket, he holds it in front of him and ignites the air above it. The light only illuminates the area around him, touching just what’s close. He holds it up higher then casts it into nothing, the fire being slung over a small span of rolling hills, showing nothing but a barren wasteland of cut trees and dead grass. Caleb misses Molly. Caleb misses the feeling of his presence. He misses the passing glances from Molly to see if Caleb was okay. He misses the forehead kisses that were few and far between. Caleb misses the familiar feeling of warmth beside of him, and he wishes he would have done everything differently. Yet Caleb, as frozen in time now as he was then, can’t even react to something he sees coming from a mile away.

Caleb Widogast, the man that’s been having the same midlife crisis for three or more years, has found himself outside and alone, on the same hill, every New Year’s Eve, and he promises himself the same thing every year. He has the same resolution every year. And yet he’s fallen just short each time. Caleb wishes to move on. He wishes to recognize that there’s nothing that he can do about it now. Caleb wishes so much that he can make peace with himself, but that has yet to happen. 

He sees a shooting star, feels his phone vibrate in his pocket, and then another shooting star. He reaches for the phone, seeing a  _ Happy New Year’s!  _ text from Bryce and the time on his phone reading  _ 12:00 AM _ . He pushes his phone back into his pocket then directs his attention back to the nightsky. He sees more shooting stars pass by, lighting the sky for just seconds, leaving trails that exist for just seconds, much like Caleb. He didn’t know of any meteor showers that were supposed to happen tonight. Caleb takes it as it is, though.

Caleb misses Molly more than usual tonight. He’s not sure why, but he misses being able to tell Molly obscure facts about the sky that Molly didn’t know (or at least, pretended to not know). Caleb wishes that he would have done something different, and yet he knows that the outcome would have more than likely been the same. What happened happened. Caleb promises himself every year that this will be the year he lets it go. While he know there’s a chance he’s going to fail again, he knows that he has to keep pushing himself. Caleb knows that he has to keep trying, because if he doesn’t, this will kill him. 

When the frozen meteors stop burning in the atmosphere, Caleb takes one final moment to say a soft wish that he makes it out alive, then he turns on his heels and starts the long trek back to the cabin. 

 

“You’re not dead!” Jester yells when Caleb comes through the door. “I’m sorry I ever doubted your ability to stay alive, but you totally shouldn’t go off on your own like that.”

“I know. I’m sorry. If I feel better next time, then I’ll stay to ring in the new year with you all.” Caleb passes a pathetic smile to her. He closes the door behind him, kicks his shoes off, and hangs up his coat. Then his joins Caduceus on the sofa, watching Beau, Fjord, and Yasha play Smash, screaming at each other and attempting to smack controllers from each other’s hands. Caleb digs his chapstick from his pants pocket, and lathers it on. The taste slight sugar cookies lingers for just a second before his leaving his lips all together. All he ever wants for Christmas is chapstick. He’s usually lost every tube of it by now, however Caduceus has a knack for finding everything they’ve lost (besides the bird Beau lost at sea several years ago). 

“Would you like to talk about it?” Caduceus asks, drawing Caleb out of yet another trance, and making Caleb he must have been staring at his tube of chapstick for an embarrassing amount of time. “It’s okay if you don’t want to, or if you can’t. But letting things stay bottled in for too long is bad for your health.”

Caleb puts his chapstick back into his pocket. He pulls his knees up to his chest, wraps his arms around them, has Frumpkin crawl into the sofa to lay next to him, then looks passes Caduceus. “Maybe sooner or later.” He rests his chin atop his knees. “Eventually.”

Caduceus smiles. “Happy New Year’s, Caleb.”

“Happy New Year’s, Cad.” 

The night passes on into early day, the sun never making itself known due to snow clouds seeming to manifest out of nowhere. Caleb finds himself doing nothing more than watching his friends have fun. He enjoys watching just as much as he does participating. But enough is enough for him after some time. He quietly leaves the room and makes his way upstairs. He grabs a blanket from one of the rooms, manages to get the door to the balcony, then finds himself leaning against the railing and wondering what’s going to happen in the field that they’ve cleared out. He wonders if it’s going to be a water park or hotel or maybe a museum. Before long, they’ll probably be flattening the hill Caleb holds so dear. He’ll have to find a new place to sulk. 

The noise downstairs starts to calm down and the sky begins to glow faintly, the sun rising high behind the clouds. Caleb checks his phone,  _ 7:53 AM _ , then responds to Bryce,  _ thank you, happy new years to you, too. _ Eventually, he goes in, cleans himself of the snow that’s fallen on him, then goes downstairs to see only Caduceus, who’s making breakfast. Caleb joins him in the small kitchen, sitting in a bar chair in front of the counter. 

“Is there anything I can help with?”

Caduceus says nothing, just passes him a knife, a large pot of washed yet unpeeled potatoes, and bowl to put them in. Caleb wonders how to cut them, then remembers that Caduceus usually just makes fried potatoes for them. So Caleb peels and cuts the potatoes into chunks, letting them fall into the bowl and moving in a rather mechanical manor. 

“Molly took me at face value,” Caleb starts. “He didn’t let anything I had done prior affect how he saw me.” Caleb cuts more potatoes before continuing. “It’s hard to forgive myself for what happened to him, yet I’m sure there’s nothing I could have done differently.”

There’s a moment when Caleb almost shut up, but he realizes that Caduceus more than likely already knows what’s been heavy on Caleb’s shoulders since they’ve known each other. So Caleb does admit to Caduceus what has been constantly burning in the back of his mind, and he lets himself be forgiven for just a small amount of time. Caleb’s heart will always be heavy. Caleb will always have Molly’s death on his mind. But Caleb doesn’t always have to suffer from it, he’s come to know. Caleb doesn’t have to live like this. It  _ is _ hard to forgive himself, but he knows that eventually, he’ll manage to do it. It’ll just take time, and the support of who he surrounds himself with. 

Caleb will make it, and live with Molly etched into his heart. 


End file.
